


me or them

by wellsmonroe (authorisasauthordoes)



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: Canon Era, F/M, season 4 nonsense
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-27
Updated: 2016-12-27
Packaged: 2018-09-12 17:58:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,982
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9083251
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/authorisasauthordoes/pseuds/wellsmonroe
Summary: Clarke Griffin was distancing herself from Bellamy Blake, and only Bellamy Blake.In some ways, it made sense. It’s me or them, he thought bitterly. And it would never be them.





	

**Author's Note:**

> happy holidays, nina!!

First, it was the black rain.

Every night, Bellamy would put on the hazmat suit from Mount Weather and go sloshing in the mud to look for their people. Just in case someone didn’t get in before the clouds came overhead and the downpour started again. And after each search, he’d return to Arkadia where Clarke was taking inventory. Then she’d help him out of the suit, complaining about each new tear and each place where the fabric was getting too thin and each little hole that would need patching with the duct tape.

“It’s a suicide mission. You’re going on a nightly suicide mission,” she’d grumble, carefully putting on her medical gloves to touch the soaked zipper.

Bellamy always had the same reply. “It’s me or them.”

And it would never be them.

\--

Then came the cancerous lesions.

There wasn’t a lot they could do about the radiation, it was coming for all of them anyway. When the lesions started to form, it was a signal of sorts—hurry up, you’re running out of time. Raven was constantly working, constantly formulating, but she wasn’t fast enough. Time was of the essence, and they were running on a clock that was set hours faster than they needed it to be.

Every day, Bellamy would join Clarke in the infirmary with her mother, checking to see who had just been newly admitted. The day Harper showed up with a strange lump forming on her elbow, they all pretended to be optimistic. Pretended it was just a bruise or a harmless cyst.

Bellamy swallowed his fear, continuing to run errands outside in the toxic air more than anyone else. People would sign up for missions but Bellamy would take them over, sending the others off to do something within the ruins of the Ark, where the air was minimally cleaner.

At the end of each day, as Clarke would return from the infirmary and Bellamy from the hostile outdoors, they’d sit together and share a small portion of food while recounting the statistics of the day. Who was dead, who was alive, what missions had been completed, who had been admitted to the infirmary.

“You have to stop taking so many missions,” Clarke would chide, nudging his arm with her elbow. Although the gesture was teasing, her expression was deadly serious. “You’re exposing yourself to way too much radiation.”

Bellamy always had the same reply. “It’s me or them.”

And it would never be them.

\--

No drinkable water is what finally got them moving away from the Ark.

It was a sorrowful goodbye, because just as being in the dropship had thrust them into a new life almost a year ago, this was another journey where it felt as though they would never come back. Although all the delinquents had a harsh, tumultuous relationship with the Ark, it was the place from which they spread their wings. It was the beginning, and that was an association that none of them can truly shake off. Not really.

On the move, Clarke, Bellamy and Raven grouped together often to strategize. There wasn’t a lot to debate on, naturally, as the nature of their situation was rather limiting on possibilities. Every meeting went the same—Clarke asked for an update, Raven stated the hopelessness of their current scenario but promised to keep brainstorming, and Bellamy stated they needed to keep moving.

And so they did. They moved and moved and moved until it felt like they had reached the ends of the Earth. Even then, they still kept moving.

Bellamy was struck by the fact that the farther they journeyed, the colder Clarke became. Rather than coming closer together as many were doing in the face of what may be their final days, Clarke distanced herself. Not from her mother, he noticed, or from Raven, or any of the others. Only him.

Clarke Griffin was distancing herself from Bellamy Blake, and only Bellamy Blake.

In some ways, it made sense. _It’s me or them,_ he thought bitterly.

And it would never be them.

\-- 

After sending the next group of corpses down the ravine, Clarke, Raven, and Bellamy regrouped once again. The air was sharper, winter moving in through cold fronts and harsh winds. All of them had windswept air and rosy cheeks, flushed from the chill.

“It’s the same as it’s always been,” Raven says flatly, uncapping her pen with her teeth and drawing a diagram for Clarke on a piece of paper. “We’re here. The nuclear reactors closest are a good distance away, but radiation doesn’t just linger around. We’re surviving, but barely. Some of us, not at all.”

Clarke nods stiffly, taking a deep breath. “Alright. You’ll keep working on it?”

Like tradition, Raven nods. “I’ll keep thinking.”

“But we’ve got new problems,” Bellamy jumps in, noticing the fact that Clarke won’t look him in the eyes. She keeps her gaze on the paper, as if it’ll tell her anything new. “It’s getting cold out there. And we’re unprepared. I think we need to cycle out when people can use the blankets we have. Or people are going to start dropping.”

Raven hums in agreement. “I can get Jasper to draw up a schedule. He’s been dying for something to do.”

“Good.” Bellamy zips up his jacket, already feeling the temperature drop as the sun sets above them. “Pick one of the mothers or children and give them my slot. They need it much more than I do.”

“You’re going to freeze,” Clarke suddenly snaps. Bellamy’s surprised to see her eyes, locked with his and glaring dangerously. “You can’t be serious.”

He doesn’t want to argue with her. Especially because he can’t trust himself not to lash out about her behavior, which he knows wouldn’t be fair. If she wants to ice him out, that’s her right. None of his business. So he settles for the usual. “It’s me or them.”

Clarke’s nostrils flare. Raven looks back and forth between the two of them.

“Fine,” Clarke says curtly, taking the paper diagram and stepping out of the shelter.

Raven whistles, sticking the cap back on her pen and sticking it behind her ear. “Jeez, you two are feeling a little frosty as of late. I know it’s cold outside, but come on.”

“I have no idea what’s wrong with her,” he says with a roll of his eyes. He attempts to hide the frustration in his voice, but Raven catches on quick. She reaches out and takes his arm, keeping him from going away.

Her expression is full of disdain. “Are you seriously telling me you don’t know what her problem is?”

“Oh, as if you do?”

“Actually, yes. I do.” Raven lets go of him and wanders around the table, making him wait just long enough to pique his curiosity.

“Well, what?”

“Bellamy Blake,” she says with a sigh, leaning forward against the table. “Clarke is icing you out because she cares about you. And you keep making it worse with your self-sacrificing bit that drives everyone crazy.”

Bellamy wonders for a brief moment what _bit_ she’s referring to, as he doesn’t feel as if he’s doing anything particularly dramatic. But the information she’s just shared about Clarke shakes him out of it. “What are you talking about? She cares about all of us. She cares about you, too.”

“She does,” Raven admits, “But not the same way.”

“But it’s like she’s just suddenly changed her mind,” he argues, crossing his arms. “When all of this started, we were working fine. Like a team, like we always do. We were practically inseparable.”

“Oh, don’t worry, we noticed.”

“But then, once we start moving, everything shifts. How do you explain that?”

Raven pauses, tapping her pen against the surface of the table. “Bellamy, you remember how you felt when Gina died? Or how about Monroe?”

He can remember both of those losses painfully well. They were both completely different situations, different people to him, but they wounded him in a way he still hasn’t fully recovered from. “Of course I remember,” he says in a murmur.

“Well, think about how many people Clarke has lost. That same kind of pain. Only for her, she’s also lost people she genuinely felt something strong and intense for. I mean, look, I know you liked Gina, and she was good for you. Even if I don’t think you were quite good enough for her.” Bellamy gives her another eye roll. “Clarke has already lost people so close to her. Her father, Wells. Then there’s people like Finn, and Lexa, who she really cared about. Who she loved.”

Bellamy takes a deep breath, starting to get where Raven is going with this.

“Our situation is getting more hopeless every day. And I think once she realized she was starting to feel that attraction again, that strong feeling, she decided it would be easier to cut it off entirely.” She bites her lip, pausing. “I mean, this is all purely speculation. But I’m not usually wrong. I’m very intuitive.”

“Modest, too.”

Raven smiles at him. “I would go talk to her. She probably won’t say anything, but just show her that you don’t want to sacrifice yourself if you’re sacrificing her to do it.”

This earns one final eye roll. “You’re too smart for your own good. And still a pain in the ass,” he says as he heads out.

“Someone has to be a genius around here,” she laughs.

Clarke is sitting by the ravine, watching the wrapped up bodies float down the river. She’s got one of the blankets around her shoulders and is holding the paper in her hands, folding it over and over again to make it smaller and smaller.

Bellamy approaches and clears his throat, making her jump. She glances over her shoulder up at him. “Just me,” he says softly.

She nods and looks back to the water. Cautiously, Bellamy lowers himself down and sits next to her, nudging his elbow against her. “Lucky you have a blanket. It’s a little chilly out.”

Clarke glances at him out of the corner of her eyes, a tiny smirk forming her lips in spite of herself. She stretches her arm out and drapes part of the blanket over his shoulders. “Well, if you’re that cold, I guess we can share.”

Opportunity acknowledged, Bellamy takes this moment to scoot closer to her, adjusting the blanket more snugly around both their shoulders. They sit together in silence for a while, watching the corpses make their way lazily away from them. Towards something greater, hopefully.

“Don’t push me away,” Bellamy finally says, swallowing his hesitation. “Things are getting harder. That isn’t the time to push me away.”

She pauses. “I know.” She turns her head to look at him. “But you have to return the favor. Stop sacrificing so much of yourself. I know we’re trying to save our people—,”

“Like always,” he adds under his breath.

“But it isn’t one or the other. I can’t lose you,” she reminds him. “I can’t lose anyone else, but I really can’t lose you.”

He nods, giving her a small smile. “Noted. I’ll keep that in mind.”

They exchange a long look, before Clarke exhales lightly and drops her head on his shoulder, nuzzling gently. “But we can keep sharing blanket time,” she offers in a quiet voice. “You can keep making that sacrifice, if you want.”

He laughs. “Noted.”

Bellamy had been so caught up in thinking about their people, about the others, that he hadn’t realized Clarke was thinking almost the opposite. If it was Bellamy or them, he realized, Clarke may not always choose them. Clarke could choose if she had to, but he would never make her make that choice. Not anymore.

Clarke could choose between Bellamy and them. She could.

And it would never be them.


End file.
